


The Relativity of Time

by LeoOtherLands



Series: Losing Time [5]
Category: Naruto
Genre: Alpha Rokusho Aoi, Alpha/Beta/Omega Dynamics, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Anal Fingering, Anal Sex, Antagonist Centric, Blow Jobs, Canon-Typical Violence, Emotional Manipulation, Honey pot mission, M/M, Manipulation, Omega Umino Iruka, Omega Verse, Pining, Rare Characters, Rare Pairings, Smut, references to non-con
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-12-03
Updated: 2020-03-04
Packaged: 2021-02-25 22:08:53
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 3
Words: 8,305
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21652789
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/LeoOtherLands/pseuds/LeoOtherLands
Summary: Aoi Rokusho has plans for Iruka Umino. Oh, yes. And he always gets what he wants. Even from a tough case, like his dear Red Bird. It might take time and some tricks, but Aoi will have everything he wants. He's sure of it.
Relationships: Rokusho Aoi/Umino Iruka
Series: Losing Time [5]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1510613
Comments: 19
Kudos: 38





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Just a few notes on the construction of this piece. This is obviously a sort of backstory for Time Lapse, however, several of the chapters will mirror Time Lapse, due to Cardinal's flash backs. Given that, the first three chapters of this will come out somewhat hot and fast, and the rest will come out alongside the chapters they mirror in Time Lapse. So, this story will run somewhat concurrent with Time Lapse, right up to the last chapter, when both these stories will end.
> 
> Also, with the ever lovely Eternal's permission, I am changing this up from third person to first person. I do this because anyone who knows my work knows I NEVER write in third person. I do it for Eternal because I love her. But she is being kind and letting me fall back into my natural style. So, be prepared for that.
> 
> And, well, be prepared to hate Aoi. I think we've been over that. Yes? Yes. Good. (You can also hate me, if you must. I am awful. Lol.)

He lay there, panting, a spreading fan of wetness from his thighs painting the sheets beneath him a vibrant color. Crimson. Like spilled rubies. An alluring shade, if I was honest. The color of pain and vulnerability.

But no time to think about that in the moment. My partner wasn’t exactly at his best, and he seemed to be losing more blood than I’d like. I supposed, cutting away the spread bar secured between his knees, I should have expected that. Cardinal had never been the type to take abuse passively, even on a mission, and Hakui had always enjoyed taming fierce things.

I’d _intended_ them not to mesh well. _Intended_ the long-haired, masked missing- _nin_ to cut my dear Red Bird up a bit before I came to his proverbial rescue. But I _may_ have slightly underestimated Cardinal’s will to resist and his ability to take punishment.

There were a lot more cuts on his thighs than I’d first judged when I’d dropped through the skylight onto one of the high, overhead support beams holding up the arched ceiling, to have a look at the show. At least six to eight on each thigh, one for every time Cardinal had pissed off or defied Hakui during their little encounter. And that wasn’t even considering the number of bruises dying Cardinal’s back, shoulders and buttocks, the bites littered _everywhere_ , and that wonderful band of black and purple around his neck from the wide, leather collar I’d removed directly after burying my sword to the hilt between Hakui’s third and fourth ribs. The missing- _nin_ liked to choke his pretties while he fucked them, among other things.

That particular, sadistic lump of shit had finished his last moments of life twitching and bleeding out on the hardwood floor. And _that_ was a sweetly wonderful thing. Time had a delightfully relative quality to it, if you really thought about it. Depending on what you were doing or experiencing, moments could stretch endlessly long, or flow so fast you swore you couldn’t hold them any more than water or air.

I hadn’t come to my partner’s rescue right after finding my perch on that overhead beam. _That_ would have been against the plan. No, I’d settled in and let Hakui finish up, get off. Then I’d shoved my blade through him and sliced the _chakra_ infused ropes tying Cardinal to the headboard. While I’d waited, time had passed rather normally for me, but I was willing to bet Hakui had been enjoying himself and not noticing the moments passing, while to Cardinal, it’d felt like they were never going to end.

Once I’d jumped down behind Hakui, though… I was willing to bet their positions had been reversed after that, and I wondered how long Hakui had imagined he lay there before he died.

I also didn’t have the time to consider this as long as I’d have liked. I didn’t want my partner _dead_ , after all. Just a little shell-shocked and strung out would do nicely. Judging by how he looked up at me with blank, brown eyes when I turned him over and scooped him up off the bloodied bed, I’d say we were just about there, too.

Excellent.

Good to see something had gone according to plan. All that remained was to take care of him and get the rest of the night squared away into nice, orderly boxes.

“I’ve got you, Red Bird,” I muttered against his clinging, sweat-dampened hair, as I adjusted him in my arms in preparation to _shunshin_.

“Did you get the rest of them, Jaguar?” The query was strained. Cracked from how tight Hakui had wound the collar around his throat, but still lucid and oh so Red Bird. Always worried about the mission.

“Yeah, Shinga, Doshin, their collection of pets, I sent them all to hell.” That had been the mission, after all. One to go in playing honey pot, to distract Hakui, one to take down the rest of the missing- _nin_ the masked sadist had around him. The rest, letting things go as far as they had, was just my plan, and there was no need to tell Cardinal about that… No, no need at all.

He made a breathy sound, like relief, against me and I folded my hands in a tiger sign, taking us away from the copper scented space. Our hotel room was rather homey. I’d made sure of that when selecting it. Soft beds, muted colors, a reasonable amount of space but not an over-abundance of emptiness, dim lighting with a hint of quiet yellow in it. Reassuringly cozy, that’s what the room was. And warm. I’d turned up the heat just a bit before leaving. Warmth was lulling and I wanted nothing more than to ease my partner, when I laid him on one of the beds.

My Red Bird had been through so much and I had to do everything needed to make sure that wasn’t wasted. He let me, too. Let me heal the cuts on his inner thighs until they were little more than a faint pattern dusted across his tanned skin, let me lighten the bruises and close the bites, let me lay my hands on his throat and relieve the stain the collar left behind. The internal damage to his neck would need a proper examination by a medical _nin_ , but I was at least able to make talking easier for him. And breathing and swallowing too, I imagined.

He let me, until it came time to wash the blood and sweat and cum away. Then he pushed my hands off. “I can do it myself, Aoi.” No more Jaguar now. Not in the comfort of our own room with our masks thrown aside. Just Aoi.

But there wasn’t any Iruka for him. “Sure you _can_ , ‘Ruka. But should you? I can help you shower, it’s nothing serious.”

“I’ll do it myself,” he affirmed, sliding off the bed. He wobbled and weaved his way to the bathroom, and I followed him with worried eyes, until he closed the door between us.

Then I grinned and went about stripping off the stained sheets and remaking the bed with fresh linens. I did it quick, before Cardinal got the water turned on and heated up. That done, I stretched out on the softness, half reclined on the pillows, in nothing but my under pants and a loose shirt. My fingers played with a pair of dice, while I waited unconcernedly for my partner to finish trying to wash off the feeling of Hakui’s hands.

He wouldn’t, of course. Hakui was hard to forget. It’s why I’d arranged things so nicely. Oh, Hiruzen had assigned the mission, naturally. But I’d taken it to hand. I couldn’t resist. It was too perfect.

When Cardinal and I arrived in the Land of Fangs, we’d staked out the masked missing- _nin’s_ little band and discussed what we’d do. When he’d gone quiet, I’d eyed him and pointedly said, “We should decide which of us is going to be the honey pot.”

He’d looked back at me. “I assumed I would. I’m the omega.”

I’d nodded. “Yeah, but Hakui’s… A bit deviant in his sexual tastes, from what I hear. He doesn’t care if who he fucks is an omega. He just likes anything with a cock. Given that, either one of us could play the distraction. And I like to play fair with these kinds of things, so…” I reached into a pocket and pulled out my dice, each snuggled between my fingers. “Why don’t we roll for it? Your call. Odds or evens?”

Cardinal’s brown eyes had focused on the dice, but it was like he was thinking of something else. Something other than the potential of being fucked by someone a bit twisted. “But you’re an alpha.”

I shrugged off-handedly. “It wouldn’t be the first time I’ve taken a cock up the ass. It’s rather enjoyable.”

His jaw stiffened and I grinned at him, smile all lecherous glee. “Or is that too much information ‘Ruka? You could say I’m a bit deviant in my sexual preferences, too. It’s more fun than just following your base instincts born of your secondary sex characteristics.”

“Sure,” he agreed in the same way he could have said whatever. An ending of a subject more than an agreement. “Let’s roll for it, then.” His eyes drifted away from me. Off in that somewhere else he was thinking of.

I didn’t like being pushed off. Flipping the dice into my palm and closing my fist over them, I asked, “Odds or evens?”

“Evens,” he said and _that_ was freaking amusing, even irked as I was. Odds were generally considered more common in dice rolls. He was intentionally giving himself a higher chance to lose, so his partner, me, wouldn’t have to do the unpleasant work. Wasn’t that just so endearingly sweet?

Grin falling off into mock seriousness, I let just a _little chakra_ leak into my special dice and tossed them unto the ground. “Seven,” I said when they settled into place. “Looks like you’re honey pot after all, Red Bird.”

My teeth flashed out and took my lip at the memory, and I threw my dice up and caught them again. Cheating always made me horny and my dice made cheating all too easy. Loaded _chakra_ dice were my specialty and they’d worked like a charm. I’d given my dear partner the impression of his misfortune being chance, given him the thought I was being kind and risking myself, when I’d really had it all under control.

Oh yes, that was how one handled a tricky situation like Cardinal. He’d been putting me off for months, but I was growing on him, and I now had him right where I needed him to be. Hurt and alone.

The water tapered off to a patter in the other room and the faint sounds of my partner stumbling had me stowing my dice and lazing my way off the bed. My voice laced with concern, as I advanced on the door. “‘Ruka? You okay in there?”

“I’m fine, Aoi.”

Only he wasn’t. A thump and a curse followed, and I flung open the door to catch him before he could tumble again. “Sure you are, Red Bird. You’ve lost enough blood to make you dizzy and been beat to shit, but you’re fine. Would you just let me help you?”

His body sagged against mine, hot from the scalding water and still damp. His hair was hanging loose around his shoulders and stuck to all that bare skin on his neck. Attractive. Oh yes, one thing was sure, chasing Iruka Umino was my pleasure.

“Geez, Cardinal, what are partners for if not to help each other out?” I said the words shifting him over to the bed and helping him lie down. Bare and flushed all over from the shower he’d just taken. He smelled like the soap I’d strategically placed in the bath. Jasmine and lavender. Good scents. “Let me help.” I laid my hand on his midriff, over a blazing big scar that was still fresh and had to have hurt like hell when he’d got it, and ran my palm up his belly to his chest, pausing in the center of his breastbone, over where I could feel his heart frantically beating. A little alpha pheromone in the air could do that. “I could take care of you, ‘Ruka. Take care of you the way an alpha should. Make you forget the feel of him inside you.”

“Aoi…” The word was very clear, very _awake_ , as if he were on the verge of pushing me away again.

Letting more of my scent leak out to envelop him, I leaned over him to breathe light kisses over his collar and neck. Soft things like the brush of butterfly wings. “Let me take care of you, Red Bird,” I murmured at his throat. “I’ll make you feel good. So good. So right.” My teeth worried at his skin. Not a real bite. A playful thing, miming a bite.

And he groaned under me, arching up into my touch. “A-aoi… A-alpha?”

I leaned back, hand still on his chest as our only point of contact., face kind and sad and serious. The expression of a caring companion and everything a wrung out _Oinin Butai_ needed to see after being wrecked and made to feel small. Elite _shinobi_ didn’t take helplessness well. “Can I make you feel good, ‘Ruka? I’ll be nice to you.”

His breathing was irregular, and his eyes dilated. When he spoke, it was in a throat roughened growl. “Fuck! Alright.”

Without a word, I climbed up on the bed with him, knelt between his legs, which he spread for me. Lowering my head, I whispered more of those kisses over him. Working my way over his chest to his groin. I could smell his slick when I got there, but I didn’t go for his entrance or his hardening cock. I skimmed down to his thighs and let my palms ghost over them, parting them just a bit more.

My thumb nudged a lightning bolt shaped scar, to match the patch of discolored and ridged skin on his lower stomach, and my dear partner moaned like a wounded thing. Almost whined. Sensitive, that’s what that place was. Still fresh and tender to the touch.

Pleased at my discovery and happy Hakui’s cuts hadn’t messed up the area, I hummed a low sound and dropped my head to mouth and lick at the scar. Cardinal did whine then, tensing and lifting up to meet my tongue.

“A-alpha!” He breathed out, and I nipped the mark. Not hard, but enough to make him gasp.

I continued rubbing slow circles on the lightning strike scar when I glanced up, to meet the brown eyes looking down at me. “I’ve got you, ‘Ruka.” _Got you so good, my Red Bird_ , I thought, as I gently took him into my mouth.

“Ahhh!” I liked the sound he made at the feel of me around him, sucking, moving my tongue over velvet-soft skin, but more I liked the swell of him between my lips and the way his legs went limp and his thighs trembled under my hands. Bloody perfect, that’s what that was.

Humming in contentment around him, I worshiped his cock, alternating between licking slow up his slit to, capture the glistening and increasing beads of pre-cum bubbling there, and grabbing his hips to take him deep. Bumping the head of his cock up against the back of my throat.

Cardinal’s breathing was all over falling apart, long before I stopped teasing him and gave him enough stimulation in all the right places, that tender spot just below the head of his cock, the soft underside of his shaft, for him to come with a strangled groan and a weak jerk. I slid my hands beneath his ass, when he tensed before his release, and pressed him to me, while I took him deep to drink down everything he gave me. Some leaked out the corners of my mouth, even as I drew back slowly, letting him glide out of my lips, but I caught the liquid with a finger and dipped it back into my mouth.

Glazed, slightly dim, brown eyes watched me, while my dear partner’s chest heaved, breath hitching in an uneven rhythm, even as he came down from his first orgasm. I found myself smiling gently at him, puffy lips falling into their natural, self-satisfied lines. Then, “You taste so good,” I purred, bending to press a kiss to the hot curve where leg met groin.

He shivered at the contact, then shivered again when my fingers slipped into his ass and pushed passed his slick rim and into the warmth of him. It was my turn to moan at the feel of _that_ because I was now painfully ready to go, but not quite willing to finish it just yet. More care and sweet tenderness were required first. I did want this first time of ours to be all about _him_ , after all. All about taking care of _my_ dear omega.

“I’ll take such good care of you, Red Bird,” I assured, flexing my fingers in him, stretching and seeking out that spot, which would make him come apart for me. I had three fingers in, working, when I found it. My middle finger messaged the bundle of nerves and Cardinal started hissing out curses, while he fisted the sheets. Smiling again, I kept rubbing and applying pressure there, in a practiced, oh so drown out way, until my omega had his second orgasm of the night.

Huffing and shuddering, he seemed to sink into the sheets. His bronze skin was as slick with sweat as my fingers were slick with his arousal, and his eyelids kept drooping closed in spent exhaustion. Such a pretty sight.

Smiling again, I eased my fingers out of him and dragged my hands up his hips and sides. His eyes flickered open when I brought a hand back to the scar on his lower abdomen, and I let my face settle back into seriousness, even as I moved to kneel more over him. “I want you so much, Red Bird. May I, please?”

Kindness. Ever the way to get what you wanted after rescuing one from contrived suffering. My partner sucked in a stuttery breath and let it out again. “Yes.”

That simple word and I started kissing him again. Planting gentle presses of my lips up from his navel to his chest, while I slid my pants down and away. Then I was gripping his hips and shoulders and nudging him to turn over. Getting at what I wanted, he complied, burying his face int he pillows, once he was on his stomach.

My hands glided over his ass and back. I littered a few kisses there, then took my time aligning myself with him and pushing in. My partner groaned a little under me, when I was fully sheathed. Maybe he was still hurting a bit from Hakui, but maybe not. He gave no protest when I started a series of slow, shallow thrusts.

No. No complaints at all. He lay there, stretched out under me, all tanned and toned and whining, “Alpha!,” while I rutted to hearts content. Well. Almost content. He was hot and tight around me, but not as tight as I would have liked. It would have made things better, and so much more fun, if he’d never been with anyone beside Hakui… But, by the feel of him, that was unlikely. And what with heats starting early, honey pot missions, oh the irony, and an _Oinin Butai’s_ need to blow off steam, it really was too much to ask for. I supposed I could live with that.

What really killed my mood was something else. Cardinal was truly such a pretty thing. He scrambled at the pillows and sheets and shoved back to meet me weakly, with what little energy he had left, but his face and expression were distant. Those clouded, dark brown eyes of his weren’t focused in the moment, instead turned inward and starring off at something he saw there. As if he were thinking of something else again.

_That_ was a mood killer. Finally get what you want and still left _wanting_. Typical Red Bird. He never surrendered.

But still, he _was mine_. It was me who pushed him to screaming orgasm for the third time in one night, and me who threw off my shirt, so I could draw him to my naked chest and cuddle him close. Me who brushed his moist hair out of his face and kissed his forehead lightly.

He tried to resist at first, tensing and trying to break my embrace, but I held on. “Let me do this, ‘Ruka. Let me be kind to you the way an alpha should. Please?”

His brown eyes fogged over with that far-away look, but he nodded. “Alright. For tonight.”

Perhaps he didn’t have the energy to protest, just as he didn’t have the energy to engage in our encounter, the way I was sure he would in our next. It didn’t matter. He was asleep in my arms in minutes. He was _mine_ and I couldn’t help ginning at that. Cardinal was aggressive, and I couldn’t wait to see that in our sex and in our soon to be blooming relationship.

“I always get what I want, Red Bird. And I always know how to get it.”


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Okay! I intended to post this next chapter with the upcoming chapter of Time Lapse... But I've been awful (per usual) and chapter seven of Time Lapse got a bit behind because of my being slow... So... this is being posted now and Time Lapse will be coming soon! In the mean time (please forgive me for being the reason Time Lapse updates slowly...) and enjoy!

Cardinal woke up in my arms, with me all tangled up with him and breathing softly at his neck, but he didn’t stay there for long. In typical Red Bird fashion, he exited the bed without a word, took a shower, this time to wash off the memory of _me_ , then demanded we return to _Konoha_. I agreed with no mention of the subject my partner was so stridently trying to avoid. The little matter of his having let me fuck him. After all, staying in the Land of Fangs was _not_ something I wanted after our little escapade of the night before. Slaughtering a large number of missing- _nin_ in the territory of a hidden village not your own made you no friends at all, and I had no desire to get killed so soon after getting what I wanted.

So, I let my sweet ‘Ruka avoid the subject of our intimacy all the way back to the Hidden Leaf. I even let him avoid it once we got there. Oh, yes… we said little to each other and split up after a mutual nod of farewell once we’d delivered our mission report. This might have seemed like bad planning on my part, like I was letting what I’d worked for get away. Letting him forget about me the way he wanted to. But it was really just the opposite. It was best to let Red Bird think just a bit in the end. To let it sink in and rattle him.

And he still had to have his injuries properly healed. The _last_ thing I wanted was permanent damage to that body of his. I intended to have more fun with it before I was through, and I wanted my dear partner’s body to be in fine shape for the next time I got him to bed. If you were going to do a thing, you might as well have fun while you did it. Really there was no point in _doing_ anything if it wasn’t fun.

And waiting and letting the fact he’d slept with me sink and settle like a burr into Cardinal’s mind was a delight. I gave him three days. Three days in which I tailed him and observed the affects our encounter had on him.

The first day he went directly to the _Konoha Byōin_ and had himself seen to. Including a round of day-after medications; standard practice for any omega coming back from a honey pot mission. All one had to do was _mention_ honey pot and the doctors were more than accommodating. But Cardinal had been doubly fucked and, watching him between _Iryō-nin_ and procedures, I was sure he was thinking about the fact. That look of distraction was painted all over his face.

That was the upshot and advantage of taking someone off guard, after all. They couldn’t get you off their mind.

_You had fun, ‘Ruka. You didn’t want to, but you did, and you can’t deny I did everything I said I would. I was good to you._

And that probably rattled him and made it even harder for him to forget me. He’d seen me on missions, seen me with my umbrella and my poison _senbons_ , playing my tricks. The image of me being kind was probably difficult for him to reconcile. All the better to.

_Keep thinking of me, ‘Ruka._

From the hospital, in average Red Bird style, Cardinal went to check in with his teammates: Kokage Yanagikage and Gazeru. The man seemed rather fond of them, though I couldn’t imagine why, and the three of them had a habit of informing each other when they returned alive from a mission they didn’t work together on.

After _that_ precious little endeavor, Cardinal went home to the Sarutobi compound, where I didn’t dare to follow him. One didn’t test the _Hokage’s_ personal wards. Doing so would be an act of stupidity. It irritated me but getting past those wards was the whole point of my chasing Cardinal. To get past those wards and all nice and personal with Hiruzen.

All in good time.

First, I had to catch me a pretty Red Bird. And that was going decidedly well.

I could wait.

The second day, Cardinal didn’t leave home. I couldn’t see what he found so attractive about holding up in the Sarutobi compound. _I’d_ feel trapped in there. Locked away behind walls. It was the worst possible torture to be stuck somewhere. I’d chalk up Red Bird’s behavior to his just coming off a tough mission, but the truth was Cardinal often stayed hold up in the compound. What was he doing in there? I couldn’t account for it and it bothered me.

The third day, my aggravation had me following Cardinal with the intention of confronting him, when he emerged to train. To hell with waiting and letting us both stew. I’d been patient and I wanted my treat.

Cardinal picked a secluded place out in the trees to work out. I rather liked it. The spot offered excellent places to hide and watch him work that glorious body into a high sweat, before I sauntered in, as if I hadn’t been there all along.

“Hey, Red Bird,” I said, reclining on a tree, folding my arms over my chest, and offering him one of my normal sly grins.

He paused, halfway through weaving a hand sign for a water _jutsu_. “Aoi? What are you doing here?” His tone spoke of him being truly unnerved.

_Been thinking of me, Red Bird?_

Still, I gave a nonchalant shrug without breaking my pose. “I came to check on you. That mission of ours wasn’t exactly what you’d call great.”

“I’m fine.”

I let him finish what he was doing, let him complete his _jutsu_ , and run through his form, my eyes following the flow of his body all the while, then I came off my tree. “I would like to be sure of that for myself, Cardinal. Can I just have a look at you?”

My expression fell back into the serious, sad, tender one I’d shown in our hotel room in the Land of Fangs. Maybe it was this, or just the plain annoyance covering him, which let him agree. Pinching the bridge of his nose, he let out a seething breath. “Fine. And then will you leave?”

“Depends,” I said, bringing my fingers to rest on his jaw. “Are you really alright, ‘Ruka? Not just physically, but completely?” His eyes zeroed in on me, utterly alert and awake and not a little bit hostile. I met that gaze, my own sure and steady and soft, and went on. “I’ve worried for you, ‘Ruka. I’ve needed to _know_ you were okay, needed to feel it for myself.”

One moment I was standing in front of him, ghosting my thumb over the velvet of his lips, the next he had me slammed up against a tree, killing intent buzzing along my nerves and unruly omega scent making me dizzy. “What the hell is this?” he growled.

Not in the least daunted, the actions were so thoroughly Red Bird, and nothing more than I’d expected, I let my head fall back against the bark and met his sparking brown eyes. “After what I did on the mission, I hoped you’d know, Cardinal. I’ve been pursuing you for months. I want to be a good alpha to you. Not just give you comfort sex after some mission that could have gone better, but all the time. I want to do for you all the things an alpha should. I want to mate you, to give you pups, to provide for you.” My hand slid up to cup his cheek, to linger there, soft and tender, brushed by the wisps of his disheveled hair. “I want to love you.” Slowly, I brought my head into alignment and slotted my lips over his. Giving him the faintest brush of a kiss, the first time I’d let our lips meet, despite our sex. “Will you let me do that, ‘Ruka?” I murmured, drawing back just enough to see his face.

My sweet partner’s expression was a study in mixed emotions. _What the fuck_ blended with stark surprise and _oh hell no_ and a watercolor swirl of something I couldn’t identify. An amalgamation of horror, that all-consuming distraction, fleeting panic, longing, and uncertainty. Whatever the emotion was, Cardinal stared at me a moment, frozen, locked into place, and then he was just gone. A few leaves fluttering to the ground the only evidence he’d ever been there.

Well, that and the bruises I was sure I had on my back from his roughly tossing me into the tree…

“You could have at least said good-bye!” I called out, moving away from the thick truck. And why? Because I knew Red Bird well enough to know he hadn’t gone far. He’d just gone far enough to consider me, to give himself some space, to gather his scattered confidence.

So, I moved into the center of the clearing Cardinal had been training in and dropped into a sitting position with a long-suffering sigh. Knowing all I had to do was wait, I didn’t even bother affecting any kind of attitude, and just sat, digging in the dirt and loose soil with a finger. Aimlessly and absentmindedly drawing characters there, while I frowned at nothing.

I _felt_ him watching me and sensed, as well as heard, him coming back when he appeared at the edge of the clearing and intentionally let his footsteps make noise, as he approached me from behind. “I really mean it, ‘Ruka,” I said, when he stopped. Turning to gaze up at him, I finished, “I want to be your alpha.”

His jaw was clenched and his eyes full of that distraction, but something else as well. Flickering intent. Intention to do _what_ I found out in a heartbeat. My dear partner pounced.

One moment he was standing, staring ripe, rampant, whirling emotion, the next he was snarling around my lips and tearing at my clothes. Not in the least put off, I laughed into his snarls and jerked his shirt up over his head, breaking our kiss. We watched each other, panting, then lunged forward again, messy, sloppy kissing and pushing away unwanted pants.

Cardinal brought himself forward on my lap, bringing our erections together and thrusting slowly against me. Bracing his hands on my shoulders, he breathed into my neck, “Prep me.”

I let my hands slide over his ass, reveling in the feeling of that smooth flesh under my palms. Then I let my fingers find his wet warmth and worked him open with quick precision. Neither of us wanted to wait long and he was so slick it didn’t matter. Still, I would have prepped him longer, if he’d let me. But before I was done, he growled and lifted up off my fingers.

My dear Red Bird hardly gave me time to know what he was about. He hovered over me, took my cock in his hand, aligned himself with me, and simply sat down. My eyes flew wide and my mouth formed a little _O_ at the sudden, hot tightness of him around me. I gasped, then let loose a shuddering, laughing giggle when _he_ started fucking _me_.

Rough and fast, he set the pace, letting me do nothing but hang on for dear life. “Fuck yes, Cardinal!” I shouted. “Fuck me into the ground!” _This_ was the aggression I’d been waiting for. There was nothing like having your ass rubbed raw by twigs and debris, while some wild thing dominated your cock.

Breathing out little exhalations of abandon, I gripped his hard, leaking member, and pumped it. He sunk his teeth into _my_ shoulder when he came, spilling over my fingers, and whining into the wound. I grunted and thrust up into him twice, before hitting my own orgasm, and filling that beautiful body of his. Claiming him all over again, even if he was so full of contraceptives it hardly mattered.

We were locked together like that for a few breathes, after. My sweet partner shuddered through the last of his pleasure, before taking his teeth out of me and pushing me all the way into the dirt. Then I was just lying under him, while he leaned over me, hands braced to either side of my head, trying to catch his breath.

I grinned at him, supremely pleased with myself and this performance. Not looking away from his clouded, brown eyes, I brought my hand to my mouth and licked the digits clean, while he watched me. “You taste so good, Red Bird,” I said, tentatively touching his face with my moist fingertips. “I can’t wait to taste you everywhere.”

“I thought you already did,” he returned, making my grin curl broader.

“That’s what you think, ‘Ruka. I’ll show you different.”

I’d show him _lots_ of things before we were through. Oh, yes. I had such delightful plans for my Red Bird.


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hahaha! Late! Late as always! But here's a chapter for your enjoyment. This is the last of the smut for this piece. From here on out, it is plot all the way! Time to see all the reasons Cardinal wants to take Aoi down. "winks" I look forward to writing it.

Plans which my dear partner continued to frustrate. I could see his hesitancy to take me to his home, we’d only been dating a little over two months. But I couldn’t understand why he remained so distant. We fucked like rabbits and he spent more than one night a week, when neither of us were on missions, in my bed. I knew his every contour and most intimate places, yet, his mind always seemed to be somewhere else.

It was that damned distraction. No matter _what_ we were doing, that clouded, misted-over look never left his earth-brown eyes. I’d ask him something, he’d glance at me, almost look right through me, and acquiesce with no real feeling. Oh sure, he was wild in bed, but he wasn’t _paying attention_ to me!

He should have been absolutely absorbed with me, but he wasn’t! Mildly interested in a disgruntled sort of way was the best I got. And it aggravated me!

Jealousy was a feeling I wasn’t used to, and I decided I did not like it. Especially, as I didn’t know what I was jealous _of_. If I’d known, I would have dealt with it. It was in my nature to remove things that got in my way… But Cardinal never talked about what distracted him. Never hinted at it.

Soon after our session on the forest floor, he flatly informed me he’d broken off all his other casual, sexual relationships, without telling me who they had been _with_. He talked about missions and his teammates and, mildly, about Hiruzen. Mostly their _shogi_ matches, and mostly who’d made what move and who’d won. Nothing deeper.

And _that_ was the epitome of his conversation. Nothing more. Nothing _personal_. Surface matters spoken of the way someone talked about the weather. The sky is blue, it’s been getting cold quicker than it ought to, my foster father beat me at _shogi_ again, I have a mission tomorrow, mind if I stay the night.

It made me want to rip my hair out! I gave him no reason _not_ to trust me, yet he kept me at a remove, as though he were waiting to see if he _could_ trust me. Trust me to see what he kept behind that brooding, far-off look of his, trust me with his family, trust me with more than just his body. I could fuck him until we were both old, but it wouldn’t bring us together intimately, as I wanted, or bring me closer to Hiruzen.

I _needed_ to get his attention. _Needed_ to get him wrapped up in me. I needed to get creative… To show him he would never find another alpha like _me_.

Grinning like a fiend, as an idea struck me, I went off to find my dear Red Bird. I found myself _waiting_ , naturally. Cardinal was in the Sarutobi compound, and he didn’t come out, until I was riled and pacing. By that point, I was seething so that I didn’t dare approach him right away.

Trying to drag myself back under control before I stuck him with a few of my poison _senbon_ , I followed him through _Konoha_ and watched him get some _ramen_ and eat it, dallying through the streets. This calmed me, or, at least, gathered my attention. My beautiful prize ended pushing away his half-eaten food and leaning on a post, staring out over the lake and watching the sunset.

Or, watching nothing. His earthen eyes were dull and fogged and didn’t seem to really _see_ anything. Distracted again, one of his arms, held above his head, bracing him on the post, while the fingers of his other hand slid down to trial over his lower stomach. Over that place where the burn scar discolored and ridged his skin.

The sight calmed me, cooling my heated emotions for several reasons. One of which being I had to admit, looing at him standing there like that, he was damned beautiful. Not just a beautiful prize I’d acquired, but damned beautiful all on his own. He was all bronze in the golden evening light, his hair down around his shoulders, for once, and his eyes distant and intent.

That was the other reason I found myself staring at him with pure wonder. That distraction in his expression was a fascination in itself. What was he thinking about with such rapped abandon? _Who_ was he thinking about with the kind of longing that painted him in a picture of mellow melancholy? Whatever the answers, he made me want to cock my head to the side and study him with furrowed brow, until I could understand what existed below his surface.

Who was Iruka Umino? I wondered…

Then he moved and the spell was broken, as the saying went. Cardinal went off to sit on a bench with his hands dangling between his knees, and I _shunshined_ to sit next to him. Half sprawled on the bench with one foot nudging his thigh, one arm thrown over the backrest, and a coiling grin on my face.

Cardinal wasn’t the least surprised by my unannounced arrival. He’d become used to my appearing out of nowhere at random moments, after months of it happening. Given that, he merely turned his head and frowned at me. As if somewhat perplexed by me in general and not the fact I’d snuck under his guard and popped up out of nowhere, yet again. His distraction was that intense.

I didn’t like it.

But I also had a notion how to change it.

“Hey, my Red Bird,” I cooed. “Want to have a little fun?”

“Fun?” he murmured, looking away from me, distraction still firmly in place. Cardinal had come to know what I considered fun. _He_ found it fun too. Oh, yes, without a doubt. But he still liked to play hard to get sometimes. “What do you have in mind, Aoi?”

“Oh,” I purred, sitting up, to slink toward him on the bench, to splay one hand over his crotch and press my lips up close to his ear. “I think you know.”

He shifted under me, bringing his face back around to gaze at me with his smoked-over, earthen eyes. I’d be annoyed by that if it weren’t for the fact I could feel him getting excited under my hand. Grinning at him, I ground my palm down on his hardening cock. “I think we should take this somewhere more private, don't you, ‘Ruka?”

My dear partner puffed out a breath and cursed. Then he leaned into me, squeezed me in a thoughtless embrace, and _shunshined_ us straight into my bedroom. Straight into my bed, to my delight. I laughed, tumbling down into my sheets, when Cardinal released me. We ended with me grinning up at him like a fiend, as he braced himself over my prone body with a hand to either side of my head.

“Going to fuck me, Cardinal?” I inquired, voice gone sultry and seductive. I let my hands come up to trace under his shirt.

“Don’t be an ass,” he hissed, in typical Red Bird fashion. He was never afraid to insult me, and the joke was clearly not lost on him, given how many times I’d fucked _him_ since that splendid honey pot mission.

“Oh, but this time, I’m serious, my ‘Ruka.” My cunning fingers scrolled up to his nipples and played over those, making his nostrils flare and a spike of wanting, omega scent pervade the air. Even if his eyes didn’t focus on me. “I want you to fuck me.”

_That_ made him pay attention, his brow wrinkling, even as his pelvis seemed to have a mind of its own and ground down into mine. Our cloth-covered cocks chafing at each other through fabric. “What the hell are you talking about, Aoi? You’re an alpha-”

“And I’ve told you before, I rather enjoy a cock up the ass.” I took my hands out from under his shirt and wiggled my way out from under him enough to half sit up, braced on one elbow. “But let me put it in words you can’t mistake.” With the hand I wasn’t using to hold myself up, I reached out to bop him on the nose with a finger following each word. “I. Want. You. To. Top. Me.”

Some form of fire was smoldering in his eyes, turning those earthen tones molten. The distraction hadn’t completely fled, but it only lurked in small shaded corners, like an insatiable thing, waiting for its chance to spring again. I didn’t like it, but Cardinal gave me no chance to think about it, much less be annoyed by it.

He pounced me.

Again. 

As if the idea of getting his cock in an alpha really turned him on in ways even _I_ hadn’t anticipated. I found myself flipped on my stomach with his teeth in my neck, my face pressed into the pillows, and his weight pinning me down. Wondering how I’d got there so fast and why the heck his biting me felt so damn good. It was like he was the alpha and I was the omega he was marking. Only my dear partner kept his teeth well away from my mating gland.

A good thing for him. I would have said fuck my plan and put a knife in him if he’d tired. _No one_ touched me that way. _No one_ was going to make me their bitch and their mate. Screw that bonded shit. _I_ was _nobody’s_.

I liked things neat and orderly and arranged to my taste, and I enjoyed being free.

But Cardinal was playing nice, and I groaned into the pillows, letting my moans turn to whimpers when he bit a little harder and shucked off my pants with a move halfway between using his hands and using his legs. A kind of squirming, tugging, kicking all jumbled together that ended with my ass being rubbed by pant-clad cock.

Splendid.

This was going to be fun.

Perhaps more than I’d originally thought.

Cardinal took his time savoring my neck and sliding his obviously hard length, still trapped in his pants, up and down between my cheeks. It made me whine because I was _hard_ too, and he wasn’t touching me. Just teasing and proceeding to suck hickies along the back of my neck.

“Come on!” I grunted. “Or don’t you know how to fuck? Only get fucked?”

His snarl at my taunting was heaven. Neither of us had much taste for the simple, sweet kind of fucking I’d given him on our so wonderfully arranged honey pot mission. On occasion, yes. But for the most part, we liked it a bit more wild and gritty. It wasn’t unheard of for me to hurl insults and get his mock wrath, in turn. _This_ was _fun_.

No point in doing anything if it wasn’t fun.

My dear Red Bird followed his growl with a particularly hard bite on a shoulder I suddenly found bare because he’d ripped my shirt off. His hands went down my sides to smooth over my ass. His fingers pressed in to find my rim, and he started massaging it, loosening the muscles, before sinking in.

This somewhat surprised me. I’d had several partners who didn’t seem to understand alphas needed a bit more care during prep than omegas. We didn’t produce slick, after all. A lube was usually necessary…

But Cardinal was nothing like that. He played with me nice and slow, reducing me to shameless and honest begging because I just _couldn’t take it_! Then with exceptional slowness, he knelt over me, pulled off his clothes, tossed them aside, and did a really unexpected thing. A really _fucking hot_ thing. Keeping his subtly clouded eyes on mine, he ran his hand over his inner thighs, wetting it with his own slick.

My heart was thumping in my own ears, almost pounding up my throat because I knew what he was going to do before he did it. He ran the hand down his length, slathering it, then spread more of the slick on my twitching hole. Another moment and he was pushing into me, making me buck and moan because the idea of his slick in me was doing crazy things to my head. It shouldn’t have been that arousing, but every practiced thrust into me only served to brush and push my engorged member into my usually soft sheets with something bordering on overstimulation because I was so damn turned on by him _in me_. Without even being touched, I came far too fast and far too soon, for Cardinal. Grunting his frustration, he just pushed me to tearful, pitiful mews of faint, faux protest and a second orgasm in his search for his own satisfaction. Something I was both surprised by and grateful for when he tumbled off of me to lay panting at my side with one had pressed over his face.

A thick blush was coating his cheeks and spilling out from under his hand.

It made me grin.

“Well,” I said, propping my chin on a hand. “That was pretty fun, yeah?”

He slowly slid the hand away, showing me a face stained scarlet and eyes both distant and ablaze. “Sure.”

“Oh, come on, Cardinal,” I teased, snuggling into his side and draping myself over his chest, so I could walk two fingers up his chin to his lips. “You seemed to enjoy yourself. And you were pretty good too, for not having done that before.”

His flush deepened. “I’ve topped before.”

My smile froze on my face, going brittle, as if my face were made of porcelain, though I didn’t show the fact to my dear partner. He’d managed to piss me off again, and just when I had been thinking I’d got him somehow. “Oh?” I queried sweetly, running a finger over his lips. “You’ve topped an alpha before? Do tell.”

“Not an alpha,” he muttered, jerking away from my touch. “My teammates, Kokage and Gazeru.”

Kokage, male, _chunin_ , 20 years old, and Gazeru, female, beta, _jounin_ , 15 years old. My mind quickly supplied this information with a smirk I aimed at Cardinal. “Your beloved teammates. I should have known. The three of you always were too close to just be fellow _shinobi_.”

“I haven’t done anything with them since we started this, Aoi. I told you that.”

He started to rise, but I pushed him back down with a hand on his chest. My face had gone all serious, lost all its sly cunning. My prize didn’t need to see that just then. “I believe you, ‘Ruka. You’re not that kind of man.” I leaned in to press a tender kiss to his lips and nibble the bottom one. “You’re my Red Bird, and I trust you.

“Though,” I let a new smirk crawl across my lips. “I think I’d like to see you with that Kokage. Two omegas playing together. That is a positively hot image.”

He huffed at me, and turned over, shoving his heated and annoyed face into one of my pillows. I smiled, letting my malicious aggravation slip into the expression now that he couldn’t see. My fingers trailed and walked over his skin, making him shudder. Teasing. Purposefully getting him hard again.

“’Ruka,” I whispered into his ear, after a moment. “I want you to fuck me again.”

Oh, yes. I wanted that because one thing I had, at least. He’d fucking loved ridding my ass into the mattress and I wanted him to know he wasn’t going to get that with any other alpha. Betas, omegas. Sure. But not an alpha. Not like me.

Possessive anger flared up in me, even as Cardinal threw me to the sheets and obliged me for the second time.

Kokage. Gazeru.

I decided I hated jealousy. It pissed me off like nothing else I’d encountered, and so I committed the names of my dear partner’s teammates to memory for later consideration. I didn’t like things which were in my way.

**Author's Note:**

> This salty ball of angst and glitter is an original fiction author and fan fiction writer, who literally lives for comments and reader interaction. Even if this is nothing but inarticulate vowel screams, lol. He exist on a flotilla of social media, separated into a wide array writery things.
> 
> If you are crazy enough to want to see what I'm writing on any given day, and maybe try tempting me into writing something specific, feel free to join me in my personal writing Discord [Midway](https://discord.gg/jsQw96p), or friend me on Discord at LeoOtherland#7066 if you would rather chat one on one.
> 
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> 
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